There’s a lot more to it than that. But we’ll skip the technical stuff. It won’t matter if the perception of women’s weightlifting doesn’t change.

“She’s a bloke,” a British man observed Sunday.

He was referring to Zhou, who is not actually a bloke. But lifting heavy metal plates is not what gets a girl on the cover of Vogue. Mangold saw the Olympics as the first stage of a public awareness crusade.

She wants to make weightlifting socially acceptable. More than that, she wants people of all shapes and sexes and sizes to be as comfortable with their bodies as she is with hers.

That won’t be easy in America, the land of the free and home of the facelift. We long to be that perfect Bo Derek 10, not the 347 Mangold weighed in at Sunday.

“It’s not so much big vs. little,” Nick said of his sister’s mission. “It’s just having confidence in yourself. And she does. You can see it.”

Can you ever. If personality were kilograms, Zhou could not budge Mangold. Her charm made her a media darling before the games, with appearances on HBO, MTV and other spots.

“I hope you find inspiration from my story,” she said. “I hope you find inspiration to do something out of the norm -- and it’s not just for women.”

If men didn’t have body-image issues, America wouldn’t be awash in Rogaine. Bald or hairy, fat or skinny, feminine or masculine -- Mangold just wants people to look in the mirror and be as comfortable as she is.

“I love my body,” she said. “I think it’s perfect.”

Mangold was a big kid growing up near Columbus, Ohio. She was an offensive lineman on a state-championship football team. She was also a member of the Homecoming court.

Mangold sported red, white and blue fingernail polish Sunday. They were dusted in chalk, of course, to get a better grip on the barbell. The sight illustrated the barrier Mangold wants to break down.

“I think being strong and confident and doing what you love makes you more feminine,” she said, “because you are not afraid to be yourself.”